$Id: README,v 1.81 2003/01/23 00:43:24 rbrown Exp $
Biblio@Tech Net::FTPServer - A full-featured, secure, extensible
and configurable Perl FTP server.
Copyright (C) 2000 Biblio@Tech Ltd., Copyright (C) 2000-2002
Unit 2-3, 50 Carnwath Road, London, Richard Jones
SW6 3EG, UK. and other contributors.
The server was written as part of the Biblio@Tech Schoolmaster.net
project and was kindly released under the GNU General Public License
(GPL). Please visit their website and encourage your local school or
college to join up:
http://www.bibliotech.net/ http://www.schoolmaster.net/
Major features of Net::FTPServer include:
* Feature parity with wu-ftpd.
* IP-based and IP-less virtual hosting.
* Virtual filesystem allows the FTP server to serve files from a
SQL database.
* Configurable and extensible in Perl.
* sections in ftpd.conf file.
* Supports all the latest RFCs and Internet Drafts, including MLST,
MLSD, FEAT, OPTS, LANG.
* Secure by design and implementation.
* PAM authentication.
* Resource limits.
* Run standalone or from inetd.
* Configurable server greetings and welcome messages.
* Anonymous mode.
* Run in chroot jail.
* Sophisticated access control rules.
* wu-ftpd style aliases and cdpath.
* SITE EXEC (disabled by default).
* Syslog logging.
* Set TCP parameters.
Missing features:
* Upload/download quotas. (These will be added in the next major
release).
---------------------------------------------
** EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE! **
---------------------------------------------
The 1.100, 1.101, etc. versions of Net::FTPServer are experimental
releases. This means that they may not work properly for you. If you
just want a stable FTP server which works, use the stable versions
(1.031, 1.032, 1.033, etc.)
---------------------------------------------
INSTALLATION, CONFIGURATION AND DOCUMENTATION
---------------------------------------------
Installation documentation is in the file "INSTALL".
All other documentation is in the Net::FTPServer(3) man page. After
installation, type:
man Net::FTPServer
and read the section "INSTALLING AND RUNNING THE SERVER".
---------------------------------------------
SUPPORT AND MAILING LIST
---------------------------------------------
There is a mailing list for general discussion and announcements. To
subscribe, send mail to containing a
single line in the body (not subject) of the request saying:
subscribe ftpserver
Send feedback, bug reports, questions and patches to the author,
Richard Jones .
---------------------------------------------
CHANGE LOG
---------------------------------------------
Version 1.115: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Remove bootstrap code from spec
file so rpm works again. (Broken since 1.112.) Add "ftp data port"
directive to allow server to comply closer with RFC 959 if the user
wishes to do so. But for security reasons, the default remains to use
the high ephemeral port. -- Rob
Version 1.114: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. No new features. Bug fixes only.
Fix t/150commands.t LANG test failure on some systems. Avoid race
condition in t/400sighup.t that can occur when client connects before
SIGHUP is done restarting the server. Fixed the RMD bug introduced
from Luis' Darwin / Mac OS X "removing directoring" patch in 1.112.
Now RMD works again for the "Full" personality. -- Rob
Version 1.113: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Removed all XS code. Signal
handlers are pure perl now even for older versions of perl < 5.7.
Concept taken from Net::Server::SIG in order to avoid dangerous
pitfalls of unsafe signal handling in older versions of perl. -- Rob
Version 1.112: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Avoids sleeping in Makefile.PL if
you set NET_FTPSERVER_NO_SLEEP=1. If Perl version >= 5.7.2, then the
XS-based safe signals code is disabled. These later Perl versions
include safe signals, so it is not needed. Note to package
maintainers: if using Perl >= 5.7.2, then Net::FTPServer is pure Perl
code, no C. Allow non-alpha characters in SITE commands (feature
requested by Brian Freeman). Luis Mun\~oz fixed a problem with
removing directories on Darwin / Mac OS X. Luis also added the 'chdir
rule' which allows finer control over what directories a user may
change into. Allow the build to work if there is a different version
of the server installed. Changes by Rob Brown: 1) Reduce redundant
code. 2) Allow easier overrides for Full and RO personalities. (That
whole "sub list" doesn't need to be copied.) 3) Avoid spewing
warnings to the logs and showing garbage to the client for a race
condition where the node has been removed between the time of the
IO::Dir read and the time of the @array stashing.
Version 1.111: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Fixed a critical memory
corruption error. Fixed and removed a faulty call to 'fcntl' which
passed a parameter by value where a pointer was expected. (One symptom
was that messages produced by the '-d' option in the system log could
appear blank). Work around a bug in Perl 5.6.0 which was causing the
SYST command (and possibly other commands) to fail at random because a
regular expression match gave $1 a corrupted value.
Version 1.110: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Workaround for a bug in
IE 6.2600.0000. This version of IE sends a leading 0 before
the IP address in the PORT command (eg. PORT 0212,57,32,3,1,2).
Version 1.109: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Tested the FTP server on Perl
5.00405, so changed the Makefile.PL to allow this version. (Note on
this version of Perl there are various warnings caused by bugs in Perl
itself -- ignore them).
Version 1.108: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Tests will now succeed even if
certain optional packages are not installed, such as for example
Archive::Zip and the "compress" command.
Version 1.107: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Last release was broken: I forgot
to change the MANIFEST file. This release corrects that mistake.
Version 1.106: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Added a "debian/" directory.
Version 1.105: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. The "Full" backend now has
an additional option ("password file") to allow authentication
against a flat password file instead of the normal PAM database.
Documentation updates for Debian.
Version 1.104: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Security fix: NLST honours the
"list rule" access control rule (thanks to Jamie Hill
<). Removed a warning generated by calling
getprotobyname. Don't overwrite the old configuration file. Added a
"readlink" function to file-based file handles so that symbolic links
can be displayed correctly.
Version 1.103: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Documentation updates (azazel).
Install start-up scripts and ftpd.conf file automatically. Multiple
fixes to RPM spec file. Additional roadmap docs.
Version 1.102: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Better handling of CPAN version
numbers in subclasses. Load Digest::MD5 early so it works with chroot
(thanks Peter Gordon for pointing out the bug). Added quit_hook (for
Bj÷rn Gro▀mann). Don't hard-code path to Perl interpreter in the
scripts. Added roadmap. Added "class" directive. Advanced command
filtering ("restrict command" directives). Ordinary and advanced
command filtering no longer log you out. They just send back an error
message. Allow limits to be set to -1 to indicate no limit.
Version 1.101: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. post_command_hook now gets the
command as an argument. Removed can_* functions from backends. In
ASCII mode, downloading a file ending in "\n0" would cause corruption:
now fixed.
Version 1.100: EXPERIMENTAL RELEASE. Various small bugs fixed by
Rob. Fixed a bug in Full/RO personalities which would cause
incorrectly formatted directory handles to be created in some
circumstances. Doubled memory and process limits so that default
install will work correctly on Alpha. Added archive mode: try
downloading "file.gz" (gzipped version of "file" will be created on
the fly); try downloading "dir.list.gz" (compressed directory listing
will be created on the fly); lots of other novel and interesting uses
of this feature: see section ARCHIVE MODE in manual. Documentation
updates. More tests. Added "visit" member for recursing over
directories.
Version 1.031: Added missed tests to MANIFEST file. Added 'make
check-manifest' rule to try to eliminate missing files in the
future. Document that %C does not work inside welcome text or welcome
file options. Added many more tests (there are now over 400 in
all). Fixed anonymous login test.
Version 1.030: Cleaned up server start of day messages. Fixed a nasty
bug which prevented command line options from working some of the time
(the bug was introduced in the last release). Workaround to keep
/etc/protocols open across chroot (thanks to Abraham Ingersoll
). Handle QUIT and client termination the same way so
there is a simpler exit path from a child process. Added more tests.
Fixed handling of multiple line configuration file keys. Added
directive for configuration files.
Version 1.029: Solaris missing RLIMIT_NPROC fixed (?). Further fixes
for Perl 5.7.2: no longer opens /dev/null twice by accident. Cleaned
up the way that command line arguments are handled and added the "-o"
option which allows you to override configuration file values on the
command line. "--help" information enhanced. Documentation updates.
Version 1.028: Change directory to root ("/") when in daemon mode
[Rob]. Various fixes and workarounds for Perl 5.7 [Rich]. Various
changes to RPM spec file so that it works cleanly under all versions
of Perl [dan at berrange dot com]. It has been reported to me that
this version does not work on Solaris because of a seemingly minor bug
(RLIMIT_NPROC is missing). Unfortunately I don't have a suitable box
to reproduce this on. Can anyone help with a patch please?
Version 1.027: VFS only required to support relative forward seeks to
simplify certain backends (thanks to Keith Turner for this patch).
Version 1.026: New optional hook: system_error_hook added to allow
backends to provide more error information than is provided by the
normal "$!" (thanks to Keith Turner for this patch). Various changes
to error log (SIGHUP now functions correctly for non-privileged
backends) [Rob]. Allow error log to contain variable hostname [Rob].
Safer untainting for log filenames [Rob]. Re-add DAEMON message
logging code [Rob]. SIGTERM is handled safely and synchronously
[Rob].
Version 1.025: Changed version numbering system slightly from 1.0.25
to 1.025 to allow version numbers to be compared [Rob]. Optimizations
to safe signals code.
Version 1.0.24: Added SITE SYNC command (needs optional File::Sync
package from CPAN). Implemented safe signals (see
doc/safesignals.txt).
Version 1.0.23: In Full personality, load Authen::PAM before forking.
Removed some race conditions involving allocating and deallocating
memory in signal handlers. Removed a race condition where a file or
directory is removed before being ``stat''ed. Tested under load with
1-128 clients. Added ``error log'' configuration option.
Version 1.0.22: Check for most recent version of IO-stringy installed
before proceeding. Added xfer logging (Rob). Don't try to allocate or
deallocate memory in SIGCHLD handler -- this was causing the parent
process to crash under heavy load (Rob). Better way to avoid warning
from loading Sys::Syslog (Rob). Better conditional loading of
BSD::Resource (Rob). If using PAM, upgrade to version 0.12 from CPAN
(Rich). Rob has reported that this version is now stable again under
heavy load. If you have problems, please mail them to:
ftpserver@annexia.org.
Version 1.0.21: More documentation on . Allow array assignments
to %config/%host_config elements. Always check the return value from
"close". Replace "lstat" with "stat" (better handling of symbolic
links, hopefully). Packages Authen::PAM, BSD::Resource and Digest::MD5
are now truly optional. If you have not installed these packages, the
server should still work (albeit with limited functionality) and
should warn you when it needs to do something which requires an
external package. Corrected pod2man warnings about command line
options not being enclosed in C<> or B<>.
Version 1.0.19: Ignore SIGCHLD in child processes (thanks to
Duane Powell for finding this bug). The code which parses the
configuration file is more strict about illegal constructs such
as using inside a section. You can use
sections to insert verbatim Perl code into your configuration
files, just like with Apache.
Version 1.0.18: Linux Magazine has an article about Net::FTPServer
here: http://www.linux-mag.com/2001-05/toc.html . Avoid storing
children hash within the child process to save memory. A better way
to remove warnings printed when "syslog.ph" is loaded.
Version 1.0.17: Replaced local function ``syslog'' with ``log'', since
it clashes with certain versions of the ``Sys::Syslog'' module which
try to import their own ``syslog'' function even if you tell them not
to. Fixed dependencies in RPM spec file.
Version 1.0.16: ``max clients'' configuration option allows you to
limit the number of clients who may simultaneously connect [Rob]. You
can also use ``%x'' in messages to refer to the maximum number of
clients. ``hide passwords in client log'' configuration option: if
set, don't log PASS commands in the client log [Rich]. ``rename rule''
allows fine-grained control of renaming files [Rob]. Fixed SIZE on a
non-readable ASCII (TYPE A) file [Rob]. Fixed ``zero node'' bug
(previously it was impossible to create a file or directory called
``0'') [Rob]. Fixed a small bug with the ``list rule'' directive
[Rob]. Fixed a problem with various places where using ``/'' as an
argument would cause crash [Rob]. Remove HTMLLIBPODS rule in the
Makefile [Rich]. The website is no more: the software will always be
released first and only to CPAN from now on. To get notification of
releases, please subscribe to the ftpserver mailing list.
Version 1.0.15: Several patches from Rob which fix some warnings and
bugs which would crash the server child process when a user did MKD /
and other similarly bizarre commands. Also, MLST / now works. Common
wildcard to regex and wildcard to SQL LIKE functions moved to parent
class.
Version 1.0.14: Documentation for /etc/ftpd.conf options moved into
the manual page. This aids maintenance considerably.
Version 1.0.12: This contains a small featurette suggested by Rob. You
can now disable syslogging from the configuration file. During the
automatic tests (make test), syslogging is now disabled by default.
Version 1.0.11: If getpwuid or getgrgid cannot resolve a user ID /
group ID into a username or group name, then we print "-" instead,
rather than generating an annoying warning message. Thanks go to
Elliot Finley and Matthias Ivers who both spotted the bug at about the
same time!
Version 1.0.10: Several patches from Rob which fix warnings and a bug
which would crash the server child process when a user did SIZE . and
similar.
Version 1.0.9: Patch from Rob: ls -al, issued from the Windows command
line FTP client, now gives a pretty listing. This also worksaround a
number of other clients which like to issue (incorrect) commands like:
NLST -al.
Version 1.0.8: Don't use /etc/group directly -- use getgrent instead.
Version 1.0.7: Keep /etc/group open across chroot.
Version 1.0.6: initgroups fixed by Rich (thanks to Matthew Gabeler-Lee
for pointing out the problem). Small changes to logging usernames by
Rob.
Version 1.0.4: A small patch from Rob Brown which avoids the server
leaving zombie processes lying around in some situations.
Version 1.0.3: This version contains patches to make the full server
work correctly on OpenBSD. (Thanks to Azazel).
Version 1.0.2: This contains some necessary bugfixes over the 1.0.0
and 1.0.1 releases. Patch to this version if you had problems with
those releases. (Thanks to Rob Brown for these fixes).
Version 1.0.1: I've done next to nothing for this release, but Rob
Brown has been at it again, producing a beautiful series of bug fixes
and enhancements. In no particular order: Avoid hard coded "." and
".." entries in directories. Logging is taint-clean in Perl
5.005. Don't log out-of-band data into client log. Added ident (RFC
1413) logging for increased security. Added "time zone" configuration
file option so that dates and times can appear in zones other than
GMT. Allow parent daemon to be restarted cleanly even if there are
child daemons still left over from the previous process. Sending
SIGHUP causes the parent process to cleanly restart, reload
configuration files and reopen client logging file (this even works if
the daemon has bound to a low-numbered port and dropped priviledges).
Version 1.0.0: Fixed for this release by Rich: STOU now works. Listing
files by wildcard now works in the "in memory" personality. Added
STOR/STOU/APPE tests. Added LIST/NLST tests. Added SITE IDLE
test. Added SITE VERSION test. Added REST test. Added RNFR/RNTO
test. Added ABOR test. Added "no authentication commands"
configuration option. Fixed for this release by Rob Brown: "Client
logging" feature. Distinguish between sending TERM to the daemonized
process and to the child processes. Implement ABOR-ted transfers using
SIGURG. Added post_bind_hook. DoS attack avoided by reseting the alarm
after read and before write. Abort if configuration file is
missing. Added transfer_hook.
Version 0.9.9: This fixes a nasty bug with uploading ASCII files. Also
added: A fairly complete test suite [Rich]. A cute "in memory"
personality [Rich]. Catch errors on ASCII STOR (upload) and report to
the client [Rob Brown]. Eliminate the idle transfer DoS bug [Rob
Brown]. Never reset the ALRM catcher to inifinity (alarm 0) [Rob
Brown]. Pull all clients that are idle even mid-transfer [Rob Brown].
Avoid timing out clients that are actively transfering [Rob
Brown]. Missing files added to the MANIFEST [Rich].
Version 0.9.8: In no particular order: Port numbers opened by the FTP
server in passive mode can be configured in ranges from the
configuration file (this should improve things if you run a firewall
in front of your server). Removed extra spaces in "Entering Passive
Mode" string. Code tidying. Add "print" method to IO::Blob - you can
now upload ASCII files to the database. In STOR, error messages
actually reflect error conditions. Fixed calls to
syswrite(). Incomplete three-way TCP handshake no longer crashes the
server. Add -P option on the command line to supply name of
pidfile. Delete pidfile when main process dies. (Thanks to Rob Brown
for the bulk of these fixes).
Version 0.9.6: Fixed a bug with LISTing files in subdirectories
(thanks to all @about-inc.com).
Version 0.9.5: I fixed a raft of portability problems on Solaris
2.7. However, there remains a problem that the Perl version I have on
Solaris doesn't call initgroups(3) correctly when the process GID is
changed, and hence doesn't drop privileges properly. This is beyond my
experience to fix -- seemingly requiring deep changes to Perl itself?
It also works OK on Linux and *BSD, and that's all that really
concerns me anyway.
Version 0.9.4: Fixed a few problems with older versions of PostgreSQL
(versions <= 6.3).
Version 0.9.3: Fixed compatibility problems with ncftp versions 2.4.3
and 3.0.2. Mostly fixed MLST/MLSD commands. Added --help option. Fixed
-V option.
Version 0.9.2: Bug fixes and clean ups.
Version 0.9.1: Many documentation updates. Added easily customizable
SITE commands.
Version 0.9.0: Added a anonymous read-only FTP personality. With this
personality, the FTP server contains no code which could be used to
write, create directories, delete files, etc. The FTP server will also
only accept anonymous logins, and contains no code for checking
/etc/passwd or PAM. This is a candidate for a 1.0.0 release. Please
download it, play with it, and send me your feedback.
Version 0.8.4: Added the missing database schema.
Version 0.8.3: This version has a fairly complete example database
back-end for those that wanted to see that.
Version 0.8.0: This is a highly experimental release which adds a
partially implemented database back-end. This is just for people
interested in database back-ends to the FTP server.
Version 0.7.2: This fixes a problem when the FTP server is run from
inetd (thanks again to Matthew Gabeler-Lee).
Version 0.7.1: This is a stable, high quality release. Several
important bug fixes, including an important fix to access control
rules (thanks to Matthew Gabeler-Lee for pointing this one out).
Version 0.6.1: This release is highly experimental, but I did all of 5
minutes of testing and it appeared to work for me. Changes: bug fixes
and enhancements too numerous to mention. Major change: separated out
the file access back-end to improve security (our database version now
no longer contains redundant file access code). Included a few more
documents.
Version 0.5.1: This fixes a problem in Makefile.PL which prevented the
program from building on some platforms.
Version 0.5.0: This major release incorporates support for both
IP-based and IP-less virtual hosting.
Version 0.4.5: This version contains a few modifications for
submission to CPAN.
Version 0.4.4: First public release.